Lack of experience?

[LloydAlexander]

I'm currently a california resident, I have a 3.8 gpa. I'm scheduled to take the MCAT soon, I've been putting a lot of time into studying and other preparation for it and I feel confident I'll do well. However, I have very minimal ECs. This is due to an overall lack of time. I live on my own, I have no one helping me. I work full time and take at least 15-20 units each quarter. I really cannot afford to cut back on work to do volunteering. All I've had time for is shadowing once a week. If I explain this, are med schools going to be understanding of my situation, or is there no way?
My alternative is to wait until after I graduate when my schedule frees up from school, and take a year to gain some experience, although I would rather not do this unless it's absolutely necessary. I was hoping to jump right into med school.
Any feedback would be greatly appreciated.
Thank you!

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[candbgirl]

Doubtful. You are under lots of pressure and you are busy but there are thousands of other pre-meds in the same boat. A gap year isn't the worse thing that can happen to you.


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[mitch8017]

Where do you work? That could be played into your ECs and adcoms can look favorably upon working 30-40 hours a week and still managing to keep your grades up. If you have more than 50 or so hours of shadowing you are covered there and could use that time for something else, however, adcoms can look unfavorably or just disregard an obvious late attempt to slap something on your application